A spoof Russian news report that China’s DeepSeek AI app was based on a secret Soviet code has gone viral after being reported as factual on state TV.
Russian fake news website Panorama, which calls itself a satirical publication and is transparent about its fictional content, ran a fabricated interview with Liang Wenfeng, the founder of DeepSeek, in which he praised Soviet programmers.
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The fake interview claimed that the code used by the startup was created in 1985 by a team led by scientist Viktor Glushkov, regarded as the creator of the first Soviet personal computer in the 1960s.
Glushkov also developed a data-processing network that was designed to help run the Soviet planned economy. Some Russian scientists argued that the network had some early features of artificial intelligence.
The fake story went viral and was reported by the Rossiya One national state television channel as if it was a genuine news item.
It was also picked up by influential social media accounts, with veteran Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov posting on Telegram: “Not only was the Soviet Union the most educated and advanced country. The Soviet Union was a scientific and technological civilization.”
The post was later removed after the spoof was revealed.
Russia’s real cooperation with China
The fake story was likely given extra credibility due to Russia’s well-known ambitions to cooperate with China on AI models under a ‘no limits’ strategic partnership.
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Earlier on Thursday a top executive in Russia’s Sberbank, one of the country’s leading players in artificial intelligence, told Reuters that the company plans to work with Chinese researchers on joint AI projects, including for military applications.
Sberbank, under CEO German Gref, has transformed itself from a Soviet-style former state savings bank burdened by onerous bureaucracy into one of Russia’s leading players in artificial intelligence and released its GigaChat model in 2023.
“Sberbank has many scientists. Through them, we plan to conduct joint research projects with researchers from China,” Sberbank First Deputy CEO Alexander Vedyakhin told Reuters.
He did not specify who the bank plans to collaborate with in China.
Moscow lags behind in the AI race
Russia’s President Vladimir Putin has urged the BRICS members, a grouping of economies that is sometimes cast as an alternative to the G7 powers, to build stronger ties in the AI field to challenge US dominance.
Russia ranks only 31st out of 83 countries for AI implementation, innovation and investment according to UK-based Tortoise Media’s Global AI Index, trailing not only the United States and China but also fellow BRICS members India and Brazil.
The country, which has two major domestic AI models, is eyeing closely China’s successes in artificial intelligence as the latest DeepSeek models, released last month, have upended the global tech landscape.
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